


Partners?

by ibreathefiiire



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-27
Updated: 2014-12-27
Packaged: 2018-03-03 21:08:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,682
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2887967
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ibreathefiiire/pseuds/ibreathefiiire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean works in a used books store, Cas works in a punk rock coffee shop. When their owners decide to partner together, a rivalry ensues between the employees.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Partners?

**Author's Note:**

> Written for save-an-impala-ride-an-angel on tumblr, for a destiel secret santa program. Merry Christmas!

In the sleepy little town of Lawrence, Christmas had begun its journey to the forefront of the marketing department. Snowflakes and baubles and reindeer appeared in the storefronts, one by one, until the town square was one large mass of red and green. Strings of light twinkled all hours of the day. For the small coffee shop buried amongst clothing and art stores, this meant specialty drinks and problems.   
Business was suffering. Their location was awful, and in the mad scramble for gifts, nobody was taking the time to relax. They needed something--anything--to give them a boost.   
Anna Milton, owner of the Coffee Counter, found that something in a used book store.   
She’d been searching late at night, using Craigslist, Twitter, Facebook, when an ad had caught her eye. Charlie Bradbury’s secondhand bookstore, Used Ink, was in even more trouble than they were. It was a woeful tale of a dickish landlord, slow business, and a need to get their name out. Aside from obtaining her sympathy, the ad gave Anna an idea.   
She messaged the Bradbury woman, and despite the sunrise looming on the horizon, the reply had come within a few minutes. Charlie had her eye on a shop in the center of town, priced ridiculously high, but conceivably affordable if someone else pitched in. More specifically, if somebody had joint ownership.   
Thus, a partnership was born.   
However, both women soon discovered that they employed some of the most whiny, change-resistant people on the planet.   
“Charlie,” Dean begged, over and over and over again. “You can’t just let some internet cafe punks set up shop here. I mean, you’ve had this place for years.”   
“Your point being?” She’d asked.   
“They’re gonna scare the customers! We’ve done a good job here, and this is going to ruin it.”   
Charlie snorted at him. “We ain’t going to be here for much longer. You saw the papers. If you think there’s enough money to keep this place, even with a partner, you wasted your time at college.”   
“But if we got a cheaper place, we wouldn’t have to partne--”   
She rounded on him. “C’mon, Dean, don’t you have a job to do? I’ve been listening to this for days now, and I haven’t changed my mind yet. If you’re just going to complain back here, then I’ll send you up to the register. You do your thing with the customers, I’ll do my thing with the managing.”   
“Charlie…”   
“Shoo,” she said, obviously unimpressed with his attempts to sway her. “I’ve thought about this long and hard, and it’s the best move up our sleeve, business-wise. Plus, I like Anna. She’s nice, and we’d have better wifi if we work with her.”   
She didn’t mention that without this, they faced to looming possibility of bankruptcy. There was no need to burden anyone with that knowledge.

 

“But why do we have to partner with them?” Castiel groused. “Anna, they’re the most egotistical people I’ve ever met. They won’t like us, and I can guarantee we won’t like them.”   
“Amen to that,” Balthazar piped behind his wall of dirty dishes. The lunch rush was, admittedly, the worst possible time to have this conversation, but dammit if Cas was letting it go without a fight.   
“Oh, Cas,” Anna sighed. She flicked the ring in his septum. “Who wouldn’t like you? You’re all so cute.”   
“Not if you ask Used Ink,” Cas pointed out. “Have you seen them? Their superiority complexes are larger than Gabriel’s.”   
“When did you even meet them?” objected Anna.   
“That is not the point,” he insisted.   
“What do you want me to do, put it to a vote? Business-wise, we can’t be smarter than this. Christmas is just around the corner, and if our location sells actual gifts as well as godlike mochas, we’ll be golden.”   
Castiel frowned. “Could somebody please back me up here? Anyone?”   
“Cas,” said Anna. “Please quit whining at me. You’re a barista, not a manager, and you’re certainly not the owner.”   
He rolled his eyes. “I’m aware. I’m only saying that we could sell chocolates if we really wanted to put gifts out.”   
Anna didn’t mention that working with Charlie Bradbury had more perks than some chocolate scheme. Smart, cute and resilient, she’d be an amazing partner...at least from Anna’s perspective. 

The only thing that appeased the workers was the new store. It was modest--definitely leaning towards cluttered once all the books were moved in--it was split into two, and the location was fantastic. Squatting on the corner of two of the most busy streets in Lawrence, within walking distance of the college campus and the record store, it was a beacon to anyone under thirty. It was airy, warm, and beautiful. In short, it was perfection.   
The spell that accompanied this pushed each staff into tense promises; they would try to behave, but only as long as “those freaks” and “the pompous assholes” did, too.   
The truce was testy, though, even more so when the Coffee workers showed up late to moving day.   
Used Ink had shrugged it off, at first--the more time they had away from each other, the better. They’d set about bringing in the boxes, unpacking, setting up shelves. Jo even got them all whistling, back and forth in a melodic game of tag. It was good work.   
Their partner’s arrival shattered the atmosphere almost instantly. “Shit,” Gabriel gasped. “Holy fuck, Anna. You weren’t kidding when you said it was great.”   
The rest of them seemed to take that as their cue, tromping in with their slushy feet and their extravagant getup. Some looked to be normal, much to Used Ink’s relief, but they shouted and laughed with the rest of their group. Castiel could tell that he wasn’t in that category. He was quiet, but the metal in his face and the blue in his hair immediately had him labelled as an outsider, a rabblerouser.   
“Dudes,” Anna protested. “Aren’t you going to introduce yourselves?”   
The din quieted almost immediately, giving way to silence. A clock ticked in the background, and someone gingerly set down a box, but the only other sound was their bated breath.   
Charlie broke in with a strained smile. “Hey, how about we go first, ok? I’m Charlie Bradbury, the new co-owner. I’ll have my guys come up one at a time, say their name and their job. That sound good?”   
“What are we, six?” muttered Balthazar. Anna shot him a dirty look.   
“Yeah, that’s good,” she replied. “Since none of these fuckers will do it without help, right?”   
Charlie laughed, despite the chargined expressions of her employees. Some seemed open to the new partners. The majority looked vaguely ill.   
“Dean,” Charlie ordered, and one of the larger men looked up nervously.   
“Uh, me?” He asked. There was a note of pleading in his voice. Whether he was apprehensive of them or of going first, Castiel couldn’t tell.   
“Yeah,” Charlie told him. “You. Get up there, Winchester.”   
As he made his way between the two groups, Cas couldn’t help sizing him up, mentally categorizing him. He wore a plaid shirt and jeans--not sweater vest, thank god. His hair was neatly combed, though. That was a point against him. The blush tickling his neck made him hard to pinpoint, especially when he started talking.   
“I, um, hi. I’m Dean Winchester, and I work the cashier. Nice to meet you guys?”   
“Is that all?” Anna prompted gently, earning a few surprised looks from her own team. Normally, she was anything but gentle, but she didn’t seem to want to spook these people too much. “How about...why did you start working here?”   
The pink tint was spreading to Dean’s ears, and he reached a hand behind his neck. “Well, I started in my first year of college, ‘cause my brother likes the place and I needed a job, y’know? Been here ever since.”   
Castiel sighed. This was like pulling teeth.   
“Thanks, Dean,” Charlie said. “Lisa, how about you next?”   
Cas listened halfheartedly as each employee introduced themselves. The first day, and this was already going terribly. He was going to try, though, for Anna. By the time Used Ink had finished their introductions, he could rattle off almost all of their names: Dean, Garth, Jo, Lisa, Cassie, Sarah, Kevin, Adam, and so on. He would definitely need some time to match them to the faces, but it was a start.   
“Okay,” Charlie said. “Awesome. Now let’s get everyone else in. Should we start with the dude with the pink hair?”   
Gabriel moved forward, and Castiel went over what he would say. Don’t fuck it up, he repeated to himself. You’re doing this for Anna, and for the shop. Be polite about it.   
“Cas?” Anna requested, beckoning him forward.   
“Uh,” he gulped. “Hello. I’m Castiel, and I’m a barista. I, ah, concoct many of our specialty drinks.”   
“Sweet,” murmured the scrawny one--Garth? He seemed genuine, which bought Cas a bit of confidence.   
“I suppose I started here because my ex worked here,” he said, smiling at the memory. “I was...rather smitten by him, so I put in my application, and here I am.”   
“Him?” asked a dark haired girl. Cas couldn’t remember her name, and his head snapped up in alarm. Had he said him? He wasn’t normally so open about his sexuality, at least not where strangers were concerned.   
“...yes?” he replied. She nodded, shooting him an encouraging smile.   
“Oh, okay. I just wanted to make sure I heard right.”   
Castiel relaxed enough to smile back at her. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad, after all. 

Ten minutes later, he realized that he was absolutely wrong.   
“Please,” Kevin muttered to a persistent Balthazar. His hand were filled with aged manuscripts, and he seemed to be using them as a shield of sorts. “Please leave me alone. I have work to do.”   
Balthazar laughed and flicked his forehead again. “Oh, but this is so much fun. How old are you, even? Twelve? Eleven? Have your big boy parts started to grow?”   
“I’m seventeen!” Kevin yelped indignantly.  
On the opposite end of the store. Jo and Hester had started a drinking contest with the six bottles of vodka in stock. Both were growing red in the face, but refused to let the other pull ahead.   
There was only one way to describe the chaos descending upon the store: the beginnings of a war.   
Two weeks later, and and armageddon had begun. Charlie and Anna were powerless to stop it, so they’d decided within the first few days to wait it out. There had been a talk about not disturbing the customers, but as long as it fit within the shop’s policy, the employees had free reign.   
This had resulted in innumerable pranks, sometimes ending with damaged product or physical harm to the staff. Things were always resolved before the bosses found out, though. Fiery hair became a dreaded sight across the store; if one of them had left their office, there was trouble.   
At that moment, Gabriel was trying to rope Castiel into yet another competition.   
“C’mon!” he wailed. “That dickhead Adam challenged us to a candy display contest, and we can’t just forfeit! I need a right hand man!”   
“Ask Balthazar,” Cas suggested. “Or Hannah. They’re good with design.”   
“Mm,” Gabriel sighed. “Nope. See, I kinda already chose you. I told Adam we’d be ready in twenty minutes!”   
“Perhaps you should have factored in that I bought a new book today,” gritted Cas. “And that I am trying to enjoy a bit of peace and quiet. I don’t need you to ruin that for me--there’s hardly anybody here. Can we not appreciate the silence for once?”   
Gabriel raised an eyebrow. “You’re worse than those kooks,” he accused. “Where’s your sense of adventure? Of pride? I need you, dude, and you’re letting me down!”   
“As I’ve told you, Hannah would likely be more open to this than I am.”   
“Hannah’s not my very best friend,” Gabriel pouted. Castiel glared sharply at him.   
“Must you insist on demolishing any sense of peace?” he snapped. “Fine! I’ll help you maintain your pride. You owe me a bag of peppermint tea, though.”   
“Deal!” squawked Gabriel. “C’mon, c’mon, let’s go!”   
“May I finish my chapter first?”   
“No way, dude, we gotta strategize! We get total control of the music for a week if we win!”   
Cas perked up considerably at that. “No more jazz?”   
“No more jazz! It’s time for Joan Jett and The Ramones, baby!” Gabriel crowed.   
“I get three of those days,” Cas grunted, heaving himself up from the misshapen armchair he’d been lounging in.   
“Yeah, yeah, you and your screamo. Haven’t you got any respect for the classics?”   
Castiel was affronted. “The Story So Far is not screamo.”   
Gabriel waved him off. “Yeah, yeah, I know. Just pushing your buttons. We gotta go, though! I’ll kill those Winchesters!”   
Cas blinked. “Adam chose his half brother?”   
“Fuck yeah, he did,” said Gabriel. “From what I can tell, the kid doesn’t have a lick of artistic talent, either. You’ll crush him.”   
“I’m no artist,” murmured Cas. Strictly speaking, that wasn’t true, but he didn’t consider himself a very good one.   
Gabriel’s reply was cut off with a whoop. “You two ready to lose any shred of dignity you ever had?” challenged Adam. He and Dean had always been some of the more rambunctious employees.   
“Bring it on, Inkies!” shouted Gabriel. “We call the toffees!”   
“Then we get anything peppermint,” Dean retaliated. “Deal?”   
Cas shrugged. “That appears to be fair. Who will decide the winner?”   
Dean grinned at him. “Don’t worry, no one too biased. I grabbed someone from the bakery. Cas, Gabriel, meet Benny. Benny, Cas and Gabriel.”   
Benny sat off to the side, looking bored and grouchy. “You know there’s about a million ways I’d rather be spending my break, right, Dean?” He had a pleasant southern drawl, and though he was rather domineering, he had a calming vibe to him. Cas instantly liked him.   
“Yeah, I know, but I don’t want to get stuck listening to screamo.”   
Cas bit the inside of his cheek. What was everyone’s problem with screamo, anyway? They were going down.   
“Unfortunately, we don’t have all day,” Adam interjected. “Benny, call it.”   
Benny rolled his eyes, but obliged. “Mark.”   
The four of them scrambled into position, searching the store for their first targets.   
“Set.”   
They tensed, setting their expressions determinedly.   
“Go.”   
The teams were off like a shot, Gabriel filling his arms with caramels, Dean gathering up candy cane after candy cane. Adam and Cas rushed around frantically, trying to find anything that would fit with their display.   
“Brick chocolate for the base, Gabriel!” shouted Cas. “Get the assortments out of the way, they can be the wall!”   
“Dammit, Adam!” Dean roared. “We’re trying to win, here! Grab some gummi bears, I need them!”   
“One minute warning,” Benny said, boredom oozing from his lips. Gabriel let out a scream of panic.   
“It can’t have been nine minutes yet!” he cried. Cas frantically poured individually wrapped taffies over their creation. “Gabe, Gabe, we need a candy cane!” he shrieked.   
“They have all the candy canes!” Gabriel was beginning to hyperventilate, and Cas considered smacking him into his senses.   
“A lollipop, then, bring me a lollipop!”   
“Time,” Benny announced.   
“Fuck!” screeched Cas. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”   
The counters were in ruins, save for the two enormous towers of sugary architecture. Castiel and Gabriel had constructed a castle, complete with a taffy moat, toffee watchtowers, and Baby Bottle Pop turrets. It was impressive, but Castiel nearly fainted when he saw the perfect pyramid that Dean and Adam had managed to construct. There wasn’t a thing out of place, and despite the simple design, it was beautiful.   
“No,” Gabriel moaned. “We’re done for.”   
“That--that’s up to Benny,” Cas gasped. “There’s still hope. We can’t give up yet.”   
Benny slouched over to the two creations, frowning at both before dipping his head towards the castle. Cas’ eyes widened by a fraction. Did he mean…?   
Benny turned to Dean. “Come on, brother,” he said. “A pyramid? Fucking lame.”   
“You’re supposed to be on my side!” Dean cried. “We were roommates! You just broke the roommate bond!”   
“Wait, wait, hold on,” Gabriel interrupted. “Roommates? Your ‘unbiased judge’ was your roommate?”   
“Gabriel,” Cas cautioned. “We won. Just leave it at that.”   
“Yeah, clearly he was unbiased,” Dean muttered, shooting a glare at Benny, who simply shrugged and stood from his chair. “And it was in college, anyway. Years ago.”   
“Can I go, Dean? They need me back in five.”   
“Fine, asshole, but we’re not done talking about this,” Dean replied. Benny snorted.   
“What are you, my mother? I’ll see you later.”   
Gabriel clenched his fists and growled, teeming with rage. Castiel placed a hand on his bicep.   
“Please, Gabriel,” he murmured. “Let’s go put on some music, alright?”   
Cursing under his breath about cheaters and “stupid bookworms,” Gabriel allowed himself to be led away. Neither of them noticed Dean’s appreciative expression, or the nudge in the ribs he received from Adam. 

“What’cha doing?” Jo whispered from behind Dean. He jolted, narrowly avoiding a stack of books as he spun around.   
“Nothing,” he blurted. “Why? What’re you doing, sneaking up on people like that?”   
Jo rocked back and forth on her heels, a smug smile playing across her lips. She seemed to know something Dean didn’t, although that was almost a perpetual state for her.   
“Maybe I like sneaking,” she said. “It means I can watch you check out Castiel’s ass.”   
Dean’s jaw dropped. “No. I was...no. Absolutely not.”   
She cocked her head to the side. “Then why are you hiding out in the section I reshelved half and hour ago?”   
“...browsing?”   
Jo let out a long-suffering sigh. “It’s cool, Dean. The Caffeinators may be major tools, but even I can admit that there’s some eye-candy over there.”   
He gave up all pretenses with a helpless shrug. It was Jo, after all. There wasn’t much good trying to lie to her. “It’s not like I could do anything; anyone in the department would kill me. Evisceration, the guillotine, the rack--child’s play compared to what Cassie’d do to me.”   
“Fair point,” said Jo. “This rivalry is getting a little out of hand, huh?”   
Dean snorted out a laugh. “Tell that to them. Everyone thinks the Coffee dudes are soulless bastards.”   
“Well, they act like it,” Jo replied with a smile.   
“That they do,” said Dean. “Why does such a douchebag have to have such a fine ass, though? It’s, like, sculpted.”   
“I hear Castiel isn’t so bad,” Jo rationalized. “So maybe the ass gods decided that not being a dick made him worthy.”   
“God, I hope so,” Dean groaned. “Look at it, Jo. It looks so firm.”   
She laughed. “Look, don’t touch. I gotta get back to the shelves. Enjoy your ass talk, yeah?”   
“Oh, screw you,” Dean snarked. “Anyone asks, I’m looking for a copy of Mansfield Park.”   
He could hear her laughing halfway across the store, and wondered what she’d think if he told her that there were more interesting things about Castiel Novak than his ass. 

Cas ran into Dean a few days later, in the storage room in the back. Both men froze when they saw each other, standing and staring in uncomfortable silence. Castiel didn’t think Dean knew that Hester had told him about the conversation with Jo, but that made it no less awkward for him, and he’d been avoiding Dean ever since.   
Dean coughed, and fuck, even that was cute. “Ah, hey, Cas. Can I call you that? Cas?”   
Cas blinked. “Um. Sure.”   
“Sweet.” A moment of unbearable silence stretched between them. “So, what’re you doing back here?”   
Castiel held up his bag of coffee. “Getting some more beans.”   
“Right,” Dean said. “Right.”   
Their exits were hasty, unanimous, and did nothing to quell the roiling embarrassment in their guts. It did give Cas a bit of hope, though. He didn’t have much experience with romance, but Dean had seemed plenty flustered, and that was usually a good indicator that he had a chance. 

Cooped together in their office, Anna and Charlie were growing more frustrated by the day.   
“Would it kill them to mingle a little?” Anna sighed. “They act like the other side is full of plague victims.”   
“Vicious pranks count as mingling,” Charlie pointed out. “Didn’t one of yours go home with a bloody nose the other day?”   
Anna rolled her eyes. “You know what I mean. We need something to bring them together, since I doubt this arrangement is going to be as short-lived as they hope.”   
“It’d better not be,” Charlie interjected.   
“What the fuck are we supposed to do?” groaned Anna. “If we ignore it, they’ll kill each other, but if we force it, they’ll hate each other even more.”   
Charlie squinted down at the papers on her desk. “Agreed,” she said. “Maybe we just have to integrate them. We could start and exchange program?”   
“Nice idea,” Anna said. “But I doubt they’d be able to pick up the other jobs fast enough.”   
“Mmm,” Charlie conceded.   
“I like where that’s going, though. Get a little friendly interaction going, you know?”   
Charlie tapped her pencil against the keyboard. “It wouldn’t be too suspicious if we used the holidays to our advantage…” she mused.   
Anna stilled, then gasped. “Charlie, you’re brilliant. We need to use Christmas!”   
“Holiday party, maybe?” Charlie beamed. Anna didn’t show approval often--it was nice to get a little feedback once in a while.   
“To start,” Anna replied. “But we can go deeper. I’m thinking secret santa, to top it off.”   
“Perfect!” cried Charlie. “Make sure no one gets matched to their own department, and we’re golden!”   
Anna was more cautious about it, but she was definitely excited, too. This could be exactly what they needed. 

“A holiday party?” Garth and Gabriel gasped.   
“A holiday party?” Lisa and Rachel groaned.   
“Oh, shit,” Dean and Castiel murmured.   
The bulletin board had donned a new, yellow announcement that morning, and the employees had been drawn to it like flies to honey. It could have been anything--were they moving back? Were they getting a raise? Outsourcing? What was it?   
A fucking holiday party. Hours of forced interaction between the Inkies and the Caffeinators. Needless to say, reactions varied.   
Adam, for example, was pissed. “Some of us have plans,” he growled. “Some of us would rather spend time with family than with those punk-ass douchebags. Sam’s supposed to visit this year!”   
“Maybe we can bring him,” Dean soothed. Adam simply shook his head.   
“No, no way. Dad already says he’s going through an emo phase--we’re not exposing him to any more of them than we need to.”   
“Actually, yeah,” Dean agreed. “Good point.”   
Balthazar was taking it the way he took everything; with lots of alcohol. Most of them were used to his drunken exploits at that point, and it was Hester that eased the whiskey out of his hand with a gentle reminder that he was on duty.   
Nobody even mentioned the secret santa program. It seemed to be an unspoken agreement that if they didn’t acknowledge it, they didn’t have to do it. The party, however, just seemed unavoidable. It was set a few days in advance, and each person had been assigned something to do. Coffee workers were mostly in charge of refreshments, while Used Ink had to put up decorations.   
“Fantastic,” Dean griped. “We were supposed to pick Sam up from the airport in two days, but one of us is going to have to stay behind and decorate. Fucking ridiculous.”   
“Flip a coin for it,” Adam offered.   
“They assume just because we can make espressos, we can make--” Gabriel squinted at the list. “‘Sweet potato pie.’ What the fuck is sweet potato pie?”   
“Just pick some up at the store,” Samandriel said listlessly, staring in dismay at his own item. “It’ll be disgusting no matter what you do, so why waste your effort?”   
Gabriel puffed out his chest in defiance. “Just for that, I’m going to make the best sweet potato pie you’ll ever have the honor of eating, Sam. It’ll be fantastic, just you wait.”   
“It’ll definitely be better than my mint chocolate cookies,” Samandriel sighed. 

On the night of the party, there was only one thing widely consumed by the employees: alcohol. The concoctions on the table lay untouched, but the pitcher of eggnog was empty within the first hour. Castiel, contrary to his normal behavior, was straddling the border between “wasted” and “shitfaced.” It was far from workplace etiquette, but fuck if he cared. This party was awful.   
Dean was nearly as bad as Cas was, but not quite. He’d been sticking to the cranberry juice, which seemed to have less of a punch to it than the eggnog did. Though his words were beginning to slur and the world was starting to tilt just a bit, he could have been much worse.   
It was unfortunate for Adam, though, because it meant he was stuck in the corner with Sam and Samandriel. Both had eyeliner smudge onto their lower lids, wore clothes as black as their ear buds, and blared death metal at themselves for the entirety of the party. He wouldn’t have figured they’d get along, but Sam spoke more to Samandriel than he did to Adam, despite his brother’s attempts at conversation.   
“Hey, Sam,” he’d tried. “It’s been a while since I saw you. How’s school going?”   
Sam had glared up at him. “Leave me alone,” he’d grumbled. “I’m talking to these guys.”   
“You’re listening to music.”   
“It’s fun.”   
“We’re not actually on great terms with them,” Adam had said desperately. “You could listen to music with me, instead?”   
Samandriel pulled out a headphone. “Fuck off, dude. He doesn’t want to talk to you.”   
Adam had only kept his anger at bay by remembering that they were both sixteen, and that it was most likely a phase.   
Everybody else was completely unaware of this, though, as they watched Gabriel and Balthazar take shot after shot with a glassy-eyed fascination. It was a good thing that Anna and Charlie had left--they would have been distraught, if not furious.   
Only one thing was certain: none of them would remember anything, come morning. 

Dean woke to a pounding headache and the stench of sex, in an unfamiliar set of sheets. This was the first time it’d happened in a few years, but it wasn’t an unfamiliar scene--he’d gone to college, after all. The only real shocks that came with it was when he realized that it was Christmas Eve Day, he’d left Adam and Sam in favor of some stranger, and the stranger had a very familiar shock of blue hair.   
“Ow,” he tried. Speaking only made it worse. It earned a grunt from his bedmate, who seemed averse to moving in that moment.   
Dean snapped his eyes shut, counted to ten, then peeked them open. “Cas?” he croaked, hoping to god that he was wrong. He would put all his future paychecks into charity if it meant that the man lying next to him was not Castiel Novak, the business rival he’d had a thing for from day one.   
“Whassup?” Castiel groaned. Dean wanted to set himself on fire.   
“Oh, fuck,” he moaned. “Cas, Cas, wake up. Shit, that hurts. Cas!”   
“Water,” croaked Cas.   
“Get your own damn water,” Dean snapped. He couldn’t help his agitation, but it wasn’t exactly helping his hangover. He knew he needed to calm down. “It’s your house, you sonovabitch.”   
“Wha..?”   
“Get up, Cas, we slept together!”   
That had him up like a shot, wincing at the sunlight streaming into the room and pulling his head into his hands. “Dean?” he whispered.   
“Fuck, yes, it’s me,” Dean replied softly. “We’re in so much shit, Cas. You gotta get up.”   
“Ow,” he murmured.   
“Me too, man.”   
Castiel swung his head to the side, eyes squeezed shut. “How did you get up here, Dean? Did we really…?” his voice trembled.   
“Shit, I don’t know,” Dean hissed. “I think so. Let me just--” he pulled the covers back to reveal a crusted mess of sheets. Instantly, he covered himself again.   
“Yeah,” Dean said lowly. “We slept together.”   
“Fuck,” growled Cas.   
It wasn’t as though he disliked Castiel. Actually, Dean probably liked him a little bit too much. This would just make things so messy, even assuming nobody else found out. Sleeping with a coworker was a major no-no in a normal situation. In theirs, with the stores already at each others’ throats, it could make work hellish. Neither of them needed that, and if it made his chest hurt just thinking about leaving, that was his problem, not Cas’.   
Dean turned to Cas and cleared his throat. It felt like he’d been rubbing sand into it all night, and he winced. “Cas, this never happened, right?”   
Castiel stilled, turning to Dean with resignation in his eyes. “Oh,” he said quietly. “Yes, ah, you’re right. We obviously can’t do this again.”   
Dean frowned, squashing down the spark of hope that that brought. “Dude, hold on. Why are you looking at me like I stepped on your puppy?”   
Cas brushed a blue chunk of hair from his forehead, refusing to meet Dean’s eyes. “I’m not,” he murmured.   
“Are you...blushing?”   
“No.”   
“I--Cas, do you--” Dean stammered. “Fuck, did you…?”   
Castiel let out an embarrassed cough, still determinedly examining his sheets. “Well, it seems that I put a little more stock into sex and, uh, flirting, than you do.”   
Dean could only stare at him.   
“I’m sorry, I’ve made this awkward,” Cas said, almost to himself. “I think it would be best if you left.”   
All at once, Dean’s brain seemed to catch up to the situation. “Hold on, hold on!” he gasped. “Do you mean…” he reached a hand out to cup Cas’s jaw. It was rough, and Dean thought of the little scrapes across his thighs--stubble burn. It sent a shiver through him. Cas was still avoiding his gaze, so Dean forced his head up. “You want this?” he whispered.   
Once Castiel caught his eye, he seemed entranced. “Very much,” he said. “You’re amazing, and I don’t really remember last night, but the evidence would show that it was absolutely wonderful, and I want to do it again.” It was blunt, Cas said it so intensely that Dean nearly laughed aloud.   
“That’s doable,” he said, before crushing their lips together in a kiss. 

Charlie had wanted everyone to come in on Christmas day and exchange their gifts, but Anna managed to coax her into the twenty seventh, citing “travel” and “time with family.” Cas was endlessly grateful for that, because even if he had no family to spend it with, and Dean was with Adam and Sam (who had definitely taken the Coffee Counter’s stance in the rivalry), he had a few days of nothing but hot chocolate and reflection.   
He did receive a call on Christmas eve from Dean, which delighted him to no end. It had been rushed and whispered, since Dean had snuck away from Adam’s prying eyes to do it, but if Cas had felt a bit lonely before he picked up the phone, he was certainly cured of it by the end of the conversation. It also meant that he had a ride to work on in a few days, even though there was absolutely nothing wrong with his car.   
When Christmas had been over for two days, all of the workers congregated in a tense little bundle near the radiator. The store wasn’t open for a few hours, and it hadn’t been populated for several days, so it was still rather chilly inside.   
Once the gifts began to flow, though, that subsided. It wasn’t as though the tension dissolved at the first whiff of Christmas spirit, but there were certainly more and more smiles at the sound of tearing wrapping paper. Castiel looked around to see an overjoyed Gabriel wriggling into a new Ugly Hanukkah sweater (“It’s about time someone remembered I’m Jewish!”), Lisa Braeden clutching a box of paint brushes, and Charlie and Anna grinning smugly at each other. Cas himself received a few rather lovely sets of guitar picks from Cassie Robinson, who’d smiled and said she’d noticed music peeking out of his bag, and had given Garth Fitzgerald the special extended editions of each Lord of the Rings movie. Garth had looked happy enough to cry, and Castiel hadn’t thought to ask about Dean’s gifts until he heard a low groan from across the room.   
“Hey, when did Benny get here?” he murmured to himself.   
Dean and Benny sat huddled across from Hannah, who was laughing into her hand about whatever Dean held in his. Benny looked like he was in tears from mirth, and Dean hunched over and glowered at Hannah.   
“Jo helped me,” was all she could say between her cackling fits.   
Cas peered at Dean’s lap, where he sheltered the gift. It looked like a book, but he couldn’t get a clear glance until Benny snatched it away and held it up to inspect the back.   
The words “So You Like Men--Now What?” stared back at him, and Cas was instantly in a fit of giggles. A self help book. She’d given him a self help book about same-sex attraction.   
Castiel let out an undignified snort of laughter, and looked around the store with a growing sense of hope. They still had a long way to go, but Hannah and Benny were laughing together like old friends, and even Dean couldn’t contain a smile. He had a feeling that Used Ink and the Coffee Counter had a long, fruitful partnership ahead of them.   
Dean met his eye and grinned. Speaking of partners, Cas thought to himself. He moved over to the empty seat at Dean’s side and leaned in to peck him on the cheek. This was what Christmas was all about.


End file.
